Site Mobile Navigation

After Long Search, Philharmonic Names Top Executive

The New York Philharmonic named its new executive director on Wednesday. He is Matthew VanBesien, a 42-year-old former orchestral player who put away his French horn a decade ago and went on to run the Houston Symphony and then the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra in Australia.

Mr. VanBesien (pronounced van-BEE-zuhn) replaces Zarin Mehta, who is retiring at the end of the season after 12 years as the orchestra’s executive director, then president. The announcement ends a frustrating 16-month search in which at least a half-dozen candidates said they had either turned down offers or rebuffed overtures.

Philharmonic officials and Mr. VanBesien declined to disclose his contract terms, including the length, which is commonly disclosed in the industry. “We don’t see a reason to discuss any of the terms of the contract or agreement,” said Gary W. Parr, the Philharmonic’s chairman and an investment banker. “We expect him to be here for a long time.”

Mr. VanBesien is due to arrive in the spring for a period of overlap with Mr. Mehta, who earns $807,000 a year.

While relatively inexperienced and a leader of organizations with less than half the Philharmonic’s $69 million budget, Mr. VanBesien faces enormous challenges: persistent and large deficits, labor friction, hefty pension liabilities, the lack of an established summer home like the Boston Symphony’s at Tanglewood, and competition from orchestras visiting Carnegie Hall. Problems even extend to the orchestra’s widely scorned auditorium, Avery Fisher Hall: Philharmonic officials say the hall needs renovations, which will displace the orchestra for an extended period, according to plans in the works with Lincoln Center, which owns the building.

As Mr. VanBesien, a native of St. Louis, returns to the United States, he will also face different fund-raising challenges than he had in Australia, where he has been since February 2010; the Melbourne Symphony receives more than half of its money from government sources.

“Being the head of the New York Philharmonic,” Mr. Parr said, “is a major position, multifaceted, complicated, and will take great leadership. We think he has that.”

Mr. VanBesien, though still relatively young, brings some especially apt experience. In Melbourne he has been overseeing the orchestra’s displacement from its hall during a two-year renovation that is expected to end with a reopening in July. In Houston he also oversaw the contract extension of Hans Graf, the music director, and dealt with the aftermath of a strike. The Philharmonic’s music director, Alan Gilbert, is in the third season of a five-year contract, and its musicians and management are in tense negotiations over a new contract.

In his five years as executive director in Houston, from 2005 to 2010, Mr. VanBesien brought the symphony back from a low point. In the years before he arrived, flooding had destroyed its library and some instruments, the fall of Enron had hurt its fortunes, and a 24-day strike had crippled morale, depressed ticket sales and drove off several musicians. The orchestra shrank, musicians took pay cuts, and a European tour was canceled.

“It was a really dark time for this orchestra,” said Brinton Smith, Houston’s principal cellist and a former New York Philharmonic member. Mr. VanBesien was general manager, and when the executive director left, he was put in the position.

Photo

Matthew VanBesien, an American, now runs an orchestra in Australia.Credit
Christina Simons for The New York Times

“It was kind of a battlefield promotion,” said Mr. Smith, who described himself as a friend and who served as a reference for Philharmonic officials. Under Mr. VanBesien ticket sales and contributions increased, the budget was balanced for four years in a row, and the orchestra made it to Carnegie Hall.

Mr. Parr said Mr. VanBesien’s Australian experience with renovation was a plus in deciding to hire him. “He will be a critically important part of that very important process,” Mr. Parr said.

Mr. VanBesien, speaking by telephone from Melbourne, said, “The renovation of Avery Fisher is paramount to both Lincoln Center and the Philharmonic.” He and Philharmonic officials have spent much time in recent months discussing how to manage the orchestra’s displacement, Mr. VanBesien said. “It’s an opportunity to think differently about how and where it performs,” he added. The Melbourne Symphony was able to move many of its concerts to a longtime former home, Town Hall.

An error has occurred. Please try again later.

You are already subscribed to this email.

Mr. VanBesien declined to discuss specific ideas for the orchestra, which traces its roots to 1842 and has been the home of Gustav Mahler and Leonard Bernstein. But he sounded a local note, saying the Philharmonic’s greatness “starts first and foremost in its own backyard,” a New York City-centric sentiment often heard from Mr. Gilbert, the orchestra’s first native New Yorker music director.

Mr. VanBesien will remain on the sidelines during contentious labor talks with the players, whose contract has expired. “He’s not going to be actively involved in the negotiations,” Mr. Parr said, repeating the words when asked what would happen if no contract is in place when Mr. VanBesien takes over in the fall.

Many orchestra executives have musical backgrounds, but Mr. VanBesien is something of a rarity in that he actually had a career in one, spending eight years in the Louisiana Philharmonic as a second horn player. He joined in 1992, shortly after the group had emerged from bankruptcy and reorganized as a self-governing body. Two years on the management committee gave him an appreciation for running matters, he said.

“It opened my eyes to all the things that happened behind the scenes to make an orchestra work,” he said. “Once I started to get a taste for these other elements, it was less about not wanting to play, but more about wanting to do this more than play.”

Giving up the horn was difficult, Mr. VanBesien said, and he still feels pangs when walking by a rehearsal. But being around “the greatest musicians in the world,” he said, “is the best creative fuel you could hope for.”

Mr. Gilbert, who spoke in a conference call with Mr. Parr, said he and Mr. VanBesien had talked about repertory and shared an interest in presenting a “wide range of music,” without going into specifics. Mr. VanBesien’s orchestra experience showed, Mr. Gilbert said, adding that he can truly identify “with the essence of what we’re doing.”

After Mr. VanBesien gave up performance, he underwent a one-year training fellowship with the League of American Orchestras in 2001-2, followed by a position at the Houston Symphony. In Melbourne, along with the orchestra’s displacement, Mr. VanBesien has had to handle the search for a chief conductor, who has yet to be named.

Mr. VanBesien received a degree in French horn from Indiana University. His wife, Rosanne Jowitt, is a geoscientist.

A version of this article appears in print on January 5, 2012, on Page C1 of the New York edition with the headline: After Long Search, Philharmonic Names Top Executive. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe